NFL announces Lane Johnson suspended four games for PEDs

Eagles offensive tackle Lane Johnson has been suspended for the first four games of the 2014 season for violating the NFL’s policy on performance-enhancing substances.

Johnson blamed the suspension, which had previously been reported but only today officially announced, on a medication that he says he took without realizing it was on the list of banned substances. He did not name the medication.

“In April while training, I mistakenly and foolishly put a prescribed medication in my body to help with a medical issue. I mistakenly failed to clear it with Eagles trainers and check the NFL list of banned substances. I am extremely sorry for this mistake and I will learn from it and be smarter in the future,” Johnson said. “This will be very hard on me to not be battling with my teammates for four games – but I will be ready and better than ever when I return.”

With Johnson and Miami’s Dion Jordan both suspended from Week One through Week Four, two of the NFL’s Top 4 picks in the 2013 NFL draft will be serving PED suspensions to start the season.

Johnson can participate in training camp and the preseason but will have to be away from the team’s facility from the start of the regular season through Monday, September 29.

ufostomper, I know! I too am shocked! Get ready for the lamest of jokes and nicknames for the World Champs. Trying to think of a good one for the Eagles now,…hmmm, ummm,….oooohooooh, um, the PEDelphia Eagullibles! Yes!

As an Eagles fan, all I have to say is this: when you are drafted into the league to be a professional athlete, than your professionalism should extend beyond the field of play and into your daily life as well. A true professional of his craft is fully aware of what he can and cannot do within the regulations of his occupation, and if you are ignorant enough to ingest something that would compromise your ability to do your job via suspension…that doesn’t show respectable professionalism whatsoever.

This will be forgotten in almost no time, but it isn’t a good sign from a top-5 pick on a team where changing the culture for the better is of utmost priority.

” mistakenly failed to clear it with Eagles trainers and check the NFL list of banned substances…even though they pound into us week after week that this is exactly the kind of crap that we’re supposed to check with them about”

Fixed it. Yeah, it makes a great sounding apology, until you remember that he’s supposed to know better (and most likely did).

So, even though it could cost them hundreds of thousands in lost pay, and being labeled a “bad” guy or a cheater, these college educated men still take drugs without clearing it with their medical coaching staff, even after years of seeing it happen to other people–and then of course they play the victim. Is anyone else sick of being sold this load of crap??? Man up, you got caught, dozens of others will not–oh waaahhhhhh. Your mom should have taught you better bro.

Oh, please. You know what you were doing. Everyone knows the consequences. The banned list is accessible. Anyone who wants to obey the policy would go out of their way to look up what they’re taking, and they do. This is practically the same excuse as Mathis.

LOL, since they’re all juicing, I’m blaming the reporters who in the spring reported his weight gain, added muscle. Duh…I’d test him after those articles if I was the NFL. Media can be so dumb sometimes. NFL needs to be serious about it or do nothing at all. If these guys aren’t juicing, they’re doping.

They just need to make a catchy “Schoolhouse Rock!” song using all the names of the banned substances, that way everybody will be totally clear once they memorize the tune. A fun time killer for that long period before the draft, rookies can hear the vets try to sing it at the symposium.

The last verse is “Let’s just be cognizant that this list exists and to be responsible in advance so we don’t have to deal with this stupid song anymore”.

Sorry the beat falls flat at the end but by natural design the song is dreadfully laborious to get through and it’s not funny anymore after you get far into it.

So you mean to tell me this guy who likely took aderall or something likely harmless will miss 4 games.

When a player like oh say Aldon Smith has been arrest for making a bomb threat at Los Angeles International Airport, arrested twice for DUI including one they found marijuana on him, was stabbed in his home, was arrested on gun charges and was involved in wreck in which the car he was in flipped.

With all of that Mr. Smith he has never been suspended by the team or the NFL for even a single game during his 3 + year career…… Yet guys take one pill fail a test and miss 4 games…. SMH

Surely, physicians know about the “banned substance list” and know that their patients are NFL players so, I have to wonder why any reputable physician would put his/her patient in this situation. Is “the list” public? If not, how are athletes suppose to be more educated about pharmacology than their doctor and refuse to follow the physician’s course of treatment? Even things not on the list can give false positive because of trace elements or chemical interactions that create something else. Most people, including players, trust the competence of their physicians and do not question when being treated…they don’t say, “Sorry doc, I have to run this by my employer”. The NFL’s drug policy seems entirely too vague and open to interpretation by the league…when did Roger Goodell go to medical school?. This situation could happen to any player on any team so fans should be careful when pointing fingers!

Are these suspension announcements faster when the banned substance is a PED? The NFL has evidently been building a case against Josh Gordon since before the draft yet we haven’t heard a peep from them.

They should have an app for banned substances. The player can simply scan the barcode on the “OTC medicine” and a big “NO” will appear on his smart phone screen, followed by a phone call from the coach.

In 2014 there have now been 16 players suspended for violating substance policies. 0 of those players have been on the Super Bowl Champions Seattle Seahawks.
@Arani
Vikings are facing ped suspensions, not Seattle

Hundreds of thousands on the line, teams’ starting players availability on the line…and there’s no mechanism by the NFLPA, teams or agents to micromanage every medication they’re taking? Yeah, whatever…

Lets all get outraged when a 6’6″ 310lb guy who runs a 4.72/40 pisses dirty. Common people this stuff doesn’t happen in nature. Grow up and realize that peds have been a major part of football since the steelers first Superbowl.